Wound and surgical dressings are often used to treat, cover, and protect wounds and surgical incisions. Wound and surgical dressings come in various forms. For example, for simple cuts, adhesive bandages are typically used. Cotton gauze is also commonly used to cover wounds and surgical incisions. For more serious wounds and surgical incisions, the wound or surgical dressing may include multiple layers of fibrous material with a fluid impervious layer or back sheet to prevent exudates from seeping through the dressing.
Typically, medicaments are often manually applied to the wound or surgical dressing before positioning on a wound or surgical incision. A medicament is a medicinal substance or agent. The medicaments may include, for instance, an antimicrobial agent or antibiotic agent to encourage healing. Antiseptics are also commonly applied to prevent infection.
Catastrophic and traumatic injuries, however, such as limb loss due to bomb blasts, severe burns, and natural disasters require more robust acute treatments to prevent further contamination by debris, mitigate infection, retain body fluids, and prevent heat loss, particularly if surgical care is distant in time or geography.
As such, a need currently exists for a wound dressing system that stabilizes the wound and prevents deterioration of the wound. Such a system can provide a barrier to the environment, can remove or prevent the growth of microorganisms, such as bacteria, and can provide barriers and or absorbency to combat bodily fluid loss, among other desired outcomes of its use.